


Romancing the Physicist

by INMH



Series: trope-bingo Fanfiction Fills 2017 (2nd Quarter) [16]
Category: BioShock, BioShock Infinite
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Drama, Drug Use, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, F/M, Friendship, Humor, M/M, Romance, Strong Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-23
Updated: 2017-08-23
Packaged: 2018-12-13 23:46:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11770977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/INMH/pseuds/INMH
Summary: College AU. Booker DeWitt is fucked, Robert Lutece would like to be fucked, and their sisters just want them to work through their considerable issues.





	Romancing the Physicist

Booker DeWitt is fucked.  
  
Good and properly fucked.  
  
He needs a C or better for the credit to be worth something, and the credit has to be worth something if he didn’t want four-hundred bucks worth for scholarship money to circle down the drain, and with a big, red **F** staring back at him from the top of his physics test, he is F for Fucking Fucked.  
  
Booker DeWitt is a twenty year-old man and he is not going to cry.  
  
He’s not going to cry.  
  
_Oh God, I think I’m fucking crying._  
  
[---]  
  
“I’m fucked, Liz. So fucked.”  
  
“ _Who’d you do?_ ”  
  
“Not _that_ kind of fucked.”  
  
“ _Sorry, **what** did you do?_ ”  
  
So technically Elizabeth isn’t wrong; part of the reason why Booker’s not doing so great this semester is because he’s been taking advantage of every aspect of the American college experience, and sex and alcohol are two undeniably integral parts of the college experience. Granted, his old man might not agree with that, especially since Booker’s there on scholarship; but then, why come to college if he wants to continue jumping every time Zachary Comstock says ‘jump’?  
  
So there’s that, and there’s the fact that Booker just sucks at science. He’s terrible at it. Science and math have always been his worst subjects; English is okay, extraneous subjects like woodworking and home ec are fine too. But history, especially military history, is what his brain seems to be happiest with- that and physical education.  
  
“ _You’re doing it,_ ” Elizabeth quips, and Booker’s half-convinced he can hear his sister’s boyfriend Jack stomping around in the background. “ _You’re actually becoming the dumb jock stereotype, Booker. Please don’t become the dumb jock stereotype._ ”  
  
“And how do you suggest I do that?” Booker asks, still curled up on his bed where he’s been for the last four hours (he’d called his sister once the terrified hyperventilating had subsided).  
  
“ _Get help._ ”  
  
[---]  
  
She may as well have asked him to hack off his right arm.  
  
Booker doesn’t ask for help.  
  
It’s kind of a _thing_ with him.  
  
Being raised by a dickhead like Zachary Comstock- the brand of dickhead who looks at a weeping six year-old with a slash on his arm from a rusty nail and says “suck it up, stop being a baby”- required one to be above asking for help. Elizabeth, thankfully, is five years younger and the formative years of her life took place in the post-divorce years of their childhood, so she hasn’t developed that particular bad habit.  
  
Unfortunately, it also means she can’t understand why it’s like pulling _teeth_ for Booker to do so.  
  
It’s a rock and a hard place: Booker can’t bring himself to ask for help, but without said help, there’s no chance of passing physics.  
  
And failing physics means not getting credit, which means not graduating on time, which means having to explain to his parents why he’d failed.  
  
_Oh look, I’m crying again._  
  
[---]  
  
“I think he’s having a breakdown.”  
  
“You think?”  
  
“I do.”  
  
Robert Lutece observes Booker DeWitt, who is currently sitting at a table in the cafeteria with his knees drawn up to his chest and his arms wrapped awkwardly around the back of his head and neck. It does, indeed, appear as though he’s having some sort of mental collapse.  
  
Brigid hums from her spot next to Rosalind, legs crossed primly at the knee. “It’s midterm season,” She says, twirling her spoon around her coffee. “He’s probably not doing well in a class. I’d bet physics. I’m in the same class as him and I’m half-certain I saw him weeping over his midterm grade the other day.” A pause. “Isn’t he the one you’re mooning over, Robert?”  
  
Brigid is nice enough and Robert would like her so much more if her position as Rosalind’s girlfriend did not require so much of his sister’s time and energy. For twenty years he and Rosalind had been virtually inseparable, and Brigid’s sudden presence in their lives has suddenly and unexpectedly shaken their dynamic, and Robert is still unsteady without his sister’s constant presence by his side.  
  
Also, Brigid has a habit of saying whatever comes to mind whenever it pleases her to do so, usually at room-level volume, which leads to some embarrassing episodes like this one.  
  
Rosalind elbows her as Robert’s cheeks turn red. “ _Brigid_.”  
  
“What? It’s a perfect opportunity, isn’t it?” Brigid cocks an eyebrow at Robert. “You are a physics major, aren’t you?”  
  
The gears click into place, and Robert’s eyes widen.  
  
[---]  
  
Being mentally and emotionally attached to one’s twin sister for twenty years had repercussions.  
  
Part of why Rosalind’s relationship with Brigid had been so shocking had simply been because Robert could not, on his own, contemplate separating from her long enough to pursue a mate, and it had been amazing when Rosalind had done so with such _ease_. It had occurred to Robert on that day that perhaps _he_ was the one who was too mentally and emotionally attached.  
  
Hence why approaching DeWitt is so intimidating: He’s not really sure how to hack it, approaching someone romantically. He’s never even tried it before.  
  
And that’s probably why Rosalind and Brigid are at the end of the hall, staring at him pointedly as he stands before DeWitt’s dorm-room door. They’re not going away until he knocks, and so it’s in Robert’s best interest to just bite the bullet and do it.  
  
So he does.  
  
**_KNOCK-KNOCK._**  
  
[---]  
   
There is nothing worse than trying to hold a steady conversation when you’ve had way too much pot.  
  
Lutece is speaking _way_ to fast for Booker’s drugged-out mind to comprehend, and he catches snatches of ‘professor’s assistant’ and ‘struggling with the material’ and ‘available for assistance if needed’ (If he wasn’t as high as he is, Booker might notice that  
Lutece’s pitch is coming in a nervous, higher-pitched-than-usual rush of words, and that his hands are folded together so tightly on his lap that they’ve gone white.)  
  
Somehow, it penetrates Booker’s mind despite the chemically-forced state of delirious calm:  
  
Lutece is offering him tutoring.  
  
And maybe it’s the pot, or maybe it’s Booker’s mind just finally collapsing to a point where he can override his own pathological inability to ask for help, but the way Booker arranges the proposal in his mind, it’s not actually Booker _asking_ for help- it’s someone else making an offer to ensure that his work is up to snuff for the final.  
  
And that’s not technically asking for help.  
  
“Sure! Why not?”  
   
[---]  
   
“Bloody hell, this is insane. Does he even _like_ men?”  
  
“He does,” Rosalind assures Robert without so much as a speck of doubt. “I’ve heard stories. Apparently he can be quite the party-animal.”  
  
“And? Sleeping with a man when you’ve had a few isn’t the same as _being_ with one,” Robert protests with a sort of manic doubt as he compulsively flips through his notes to ensure everything is appropriately marked and tabbed for his tutoring session with DeWitt.  
  
Rosalind raises an eyebrow at him. “So you do want a relationship with him, then? Not just sex?”  
  
“Ideally,” Robert mutters, pulling insistently at the wire spine of the notebook. “I mean, I suppose it depends on how things work out, but… Yes.” He doesn’t look at his sister. “He seems nice enough. I like him.”  
   
[---]  
   
“Oh God, I’m dead. I’m dead.”  
  
“You’re not dead, I promise. It will take more than one meeting for you to absorb the material.”  
  
Booker has no idea if Robert’s telling the truth or if he’s just trying to be nice; he’s good at reading peoples’ expressions, but that’s difficult to do when you’re in a fetal position on your bed trying to stave off a panic attack.  
  
A hand gently pats his shoulder. “Booker, please: I’m calling an ambulance if you don’t say something.”  
  
Booker can’t afford a fucking ambulance, so he sits up, gasping for air until he’s (barely) managed to convince himself that the world has not ended (yet) and that maybe, just maybe, Robert’s right and that he just needs some time to work on the material. He’s surprised, however, when Robert leans in and gives him a quick hug.  
  
“It’s alright, Booker. We can work on it.”  
  
And because he’s got literally no other life-raft to cling to, he hugs back.  
   
[---]  
   
Robert nearly swoons once the door to Booker’s room is shut.  
_  
We hugged_ , he thinks, the one, blissful thought temporarily overriding the deep, abiding concern he now has for Booker’s mental health. _Dear God, we hugged. And he didn’t smell like pot._  
  
Once the happy thoughts lose their buoyancy, the less-happy ones rise back to the surface:  
_  
Boy oh boy, if he fails this test he’s probably going to top himself, I really need to help him._  
   
[---]  
   
They meet every afternoon for the next three weeks.  
  
During the first week, Robert maintains professional distance for the duration of the lesson and does his best to impress the various topics onto Booker’s long-term memory for later use- but he does end the lessons with a hug, the length of which varies depending on how the lesson goes (long for a bad day, shorter for a good one).  
  
During the second week, it seems that Booker has become comfortable enough to lean his head on Robert’s shoulder as they’re working. Robert barely manages to repress a very embarrassing, excited noise when he feels Booker’s hair tickling his neck and chin. He’s not accustomed to physical contact from anyone but Rosalind and he’s, perhaps, happier than a normal person should be.  
  
During the third week, the touching becomes more casual, more normalized, and it’s nothing for them to lean on one another or touch a hand or an arm; it’s only taken one month for them to get to this point, and it’s mostly because Booker is a far more tactile person than Robert and, well, Robert’s wanted to be close to Booker for a while, so the touching is easier to accustom to than it otherwise would be.  
  
In the last few days of the studying, Booker is pale and shaking and nervous as can be despite having made quite a bit of progress.  
  
“You’ll do fine,” Robert assures him, running a hand up and down Booker’s back.  
  
“I feel sick,” Booker whispers, falling to lie on his stomach and mashing his face into the sheets on his bed. “I’m gonna puke in the middle of the test. I know it.”  
  
“You won’t,” Robert says, and then, after a moment’s hesitation to wonder if he should (do _all_ people have to analyze physical contact and body-language so deeply to make sure they’re doing it right, or is it just him?), gets down on his stomach beside Booker and settles his head down on his folded arms. “You’ve done an excellent job, Booker. You’re not going to fail the test.”  
  
Booker rolls over, and suddenly Robert has half of the man he’s been pining over lying against him, too close to be anything but _intimate_ , even for someone as socially illiterate as he is.  
  
“I hope you’re right.”  
   
[---]  
   
Robert’s a good tutor.  
  
And not hard on the eyes, either.  
  
For the first few weeks, Booker has to resist his usual impulses when they study together, because otherwise he might risk scaring off his tutor or distracting them from their higher purpose. Of course, the intense, heart-stopping, waking-up-and-vomiting-at-3AM kind of anxiety he’s experiencing does a good job at naturally suppressing his usual impulses and other bad behavior.  
  
That being said, he likes Robert- the guy’s a nerd, but a good nerd in every sense of the word.  
  
And never does Booker appreciate that more than when he gets his next physics test back and sees an A- in the top corner.  
  
He races across campus to the library, finds Robert in what he’s learned is the physics-expert’s usual corner, and all but tackles him out of his chair.  
  
“ _Jesus!_ ” Robert exclaims.  
  
“ _Shhh!_ ” Comes the chorus of hisses.  
  
Booker, grinning like an idiot, helps Robert up and waves the paper at him. Robert takes it, sees the A-, and grins back. “You did it!” He whispers.  
  
“Thanks to you,” Booker responds. “Hey, you want to come to my place tonight? I kind of want to thank you better than giving you a concussion in the library.”  
  
Robert’s cheeks go pink. “Certainly, Booker.”  
   
[---]  
  
Robert sprints to Rosalind’s dormitory and finds her and Brigid doing what they do best: Talking and debating scientific theory. His sister is fortunate in that she’s found someone of a kind with her, someone she knows how to interpret and send the correct signals to in return. He bursts in during (what sounds like) a heated debate on Tesla and Edison.  
  
“Lucky boy,” Brigid drawls when Robert tells them what happened. “Do you need condoms?”  
  
Rosalind frowns at her girlfriend. “Why do you have condoms?”  
  
“I have some leftover from Frank.”  
  
“I thought you burned everything having to do with him.”  
  
“Condoms can still be useful.”  
  
“When dating a _woman?_ ”  
  
“What, you think I _buy_ my dental dams when I can just-”  
  
“I truly and honestly neither want nor need to hear this,” Robert begs, shuddering at the images he’s now frantically trying to banish from his mind. “Just tell me how to prepare for a- a _date_ without looking like a complete idiot.”  
  
“That, we can do.”  
  
[---]  
  
Booker’s gonna suck his dick.  
  
Like, that’s pretty much the sex-language translation of ‘thank you’, right?  
  
And assuming that Robert does not balk at the idea of having his dick sucked by a tutee as a thank-you, Booker plans on asking him if he wants to go for a movie tomorrow night.  
  
“ _I think you’re doing this backwards,_ ” Elizabeth says dryly over the phone. “ _I think the dick-sucking is supposed to come **after** the movie._ ”  
  
“ _Liz, who the fuck are you talking to?_ ” Jack’s voice is small in the background, and Elizabeth’s voice fades as she turns away from the speaker.  
  
“ _Booker._ ”  
  
“ _Ah,_ ” Is Jack’s response, as though dick-sucking is a common topic of discussion between brothers and sisters.  
  
“ _I’m just saying,_ ” Elizabeth says, voice normal again, “ _That in the interest of modesty and reservation-_ ”  
  
“ _Are you **sure** you’re talking to Booker?_ ”  
  
“ _-that you may want to go a bit slower._ ”  
  
“Duly noted.”  
  
Booker is definitely sucking his dick.  
  
[---]  
  
Robert might pass out.  
  
Every moment since knocking on Booker’s door that evening has gone by so very slowly; he’s so nervous that he’s hyperaware of every second that passes.  
  
He’s sitting on the edge of Booker’s bed, clutching the beer he was offered a bit too tightly, and smiles as Booker takes a seat next to him, holding his own beer.  
  
“Thanks again, Robert. I mean it.”  
  
“It’s not a problem,” Robert titters. “Physics is my specialty.”  
  
“Well, it’s not mine, and thanks for stopping me from having to throw myself off the dorm roof.”  
  
Robert chuckles because he’s supposed to and doesn’t mention his concerns that Booker may have actually been on the edge of that before.  
  
Booker sets his beer down on the nightstand and hugs Robert tightly. Robert wriggles out of the embrace for a moment to set his beer down as well, and then returns the hug, hoping that he’s being just subtle enough not to look desperate, but not _so_ subtle that Booker can’t infer his intentions.  
  
Although, even if he doesn’t, the hug is still _very_ nice.  
  
They part, and Booker looks Robert in the eye with a slightly apprehensive expression.  
  
_What is it,_ Robert thinks. _Is there something on my face? Did I do something wrong?_  
  
Then, without any lead-up whatsoever,  
  
“I kind of want to suck your dick. I mean, feel free to say no, but the offer’s there, just saying.”  
  
Robert’s jaw drops.  
  
[---]  
  
Booker’s jaw aches.  
  
He pulls off of Robert’s cock for a moment and looks him in the eye. “You have a nice dick, Robert. I mean, nice size, nice shape, doesn’t even taste too bad- and ‘bad’ tends to be the default taste for dicks.”  
  
“Oh,” Robert says, dazed. “I- Thank you.”  
  
“No, thank _you,_ ” Booker says, and then swallows Robert’s cock down again. He does his usual tricks, humming and prodding his tongue around the head and using his fingers to drag the foreskin up and down.  
  
It’s kind of obvious that Robert isn’t used to this kind of attention, because he’s making all kinds of surprised noises jerking suddenly here and there. It’s not really shocking to think this might be his first time with his cock down someone’s throat, because he doesn’t really seem like the social-butterfly type.  
  
Well, lucky for him, Booker one grateful sonofabitch, and he’s as good at sex as Robert is at physics.  
  
Booker feels Robert’s cock pulsing against his tongue, and Robert croaks, “B-Booker, Booker, I, I, I-”  
  
After a quick internal debate, Booker decides against pulling off (he is _that fucking grateful_ , man) and gives a really _good_ suck right before Robert comes in his mouth, on his tongue and down his throat.  
  
[---]  
  
Robert Lutece is fucked.  
  
Good and properly fucked.  
  
He lies on Booker’s bed, panting, and doesn’t even care that his pants and underwear are still pulled down and his limp cock is hanging out.  
  
Booker is grinning at him. “How’d you like it?”  
  
Robert stares at him, bewildered. “You couldn’t _tell?_ ”  
  
“A mouth on your dick is a mouth on your dick. How would you rate my technique?”  
  
“ _Ten_ ,” Robert says, still in disbelief. “Bloody Christ, _ten out of ten_. My God, you should teach _classes_ on it _._ ”  
  
Booker cracks up, slapping his thigh. “Boy oh boy, the money I could make.” They chuckle at that for a bit, and then Robert clears his throat.  
  
“Er- Would you… Would you like to go to dinner tomorrow night?”  
  
He’s relieved to see Booker’s face light up. “I was gonna offer a movie.”  
  
“We can do both, if you like,” Robert suggests, joy clogging his throat.  
  
“Sounds good, Robert. Sounds good.”  
  
-End

**Author's Note:**

> EDIT: I fixed a small error in the story. When Brigid says she has condoms left over, it originally said she was dating Jack- I actually meant to write 'Frank', not Jack. 
> 
> This is why writing stories at four AM is a bad idea kids.


End file.
